Roman mosaics formed part of inhabited spaces. People crossed them, sat beside them and saw them from particular directions on entering a room. A photograph may present an entire pavement at once. In its original setting, the floor was encountered among furniture, thresholds and moving bodies.1

The function of the building containing the Tryphe figure at Zile has not been established. Other Roman pavements show how the relationship between a mosaic and its room can be investigated. Dining spaces provide particularly useful examples of the interaction between image, furniture and guest.23

Leaving room for the furniture

Pavement y1965-216 in the Princeton University Art Museum depicts the drinking contest between Herakles and Dionysos. Found in the area around Antioch known as Seleucia, it dates to the early third century AD. The broad geometric areas around the scene are as useful for understanding its architectural arrangement as the figures at the centre.3

The museum reads the layout as intended for a triclinium, a dining room, with couches placed over the geometric fields. The areas covered by furniture and the scene visible to diners thus belong to a coordinated design. An architectural arch, a raised curtain and shadows create a further space within the image.3

Comparison: the drinking contest between Herakles and Dionysos. Antioch/Seleucia, early third century AD. Princeton University Art Museum, y1965-216. Princeton University Art Museum; PUAM Photo. Gift of the Committee for the Excavation of Antioch to Princeton University., Museum catalogue record y1965-216; primary orthographic view. source page (opens in a new tab) · Princeton y1965-216

Looking only at the figures would miss an important clue to the room’s use. The size of patterned fields, the image’s orientation and the open centre relate to where people could sit or move. In mosaic design, the composition need not end at the edge of a picture: the room participates in it.13

Entertaining guests, presenting a household

Elite Roman banquets brought food, tableware and entertainment together in carefully arranged surroundings. Katharine Raff’s research for The Metropolitan Museum of Art describes hosts seeking to impress through presentation as well as through the meal. Couches, vessels and decorated surroundings were visible elements of hospitality.4

Comparison: the figured scene from the same pavement, in the museum’s published detail. Photograph: Bruce White. Princeton University Art Museum / Bruce White Photography; y1965-216, View 3 in the museum record, y1965-216_CROP; detail as published by the museum. source page (opens in a new tab) · Princeton y1965-216

The subject of an image in a dining space could therefore engage with the activity taking place there. Guests looking at Herakles and Dionysos saw drinking figures from within their own gathering. This relationship cannot be assumed for every mosaic, but here the architectural reading supports a connection between subject and use.3

Tryphe’s association with ease and luxury makes such settings worth investigating. It would nevertheless be premature to identify the Zile space as a dining room solely from the figure’s name. The word expresses a valued ideal of living; a room’s function also requires evidence from its plan and traces of use.52

Drawing with tesserae

A mosaicist’s line emerges from the pieces placed beside one another. Rows can follow a contour, while neighbouring tones can model a shadow. Small pieces used for detail and more regular settings across broad areas perform different tasks within a composition. Comparing an overall photograph with a close view makes that work easier to see.1

Alper Yılmaz’s identification of opus tessellatum and opus vermiculatum together at Zile points to different scales of workmanship. The terms help explain why a pavement need not use one method or one tessera size throughout. A press photograph alone, however, cannot establish the pieces’ geological origin, composition or full range of dimensions.51

The construction beneath the image

A construction lies beneath the coloured surface. Book Seven of Vitruvius’s On Architecture describes compacting the base and building up the layers of a pavement. The ancient account places skill beneath the visible image as well: making a level, durable floor was part of the work.6

An excavated pavement is not treated as an exact copy of the written recipe. Each building’s construction and later changes require examination. A surface crack may relate to a problem below, while an old repair may record later use. The mosaic is at once an image, a floor and an architectural element altered through time.7

Research around the five letters at Zile returns to this whole. Who saw the image of the good life, in which room and from which direction? Who made the floor, and who repaired it? These are related questions. Their answers will depend on the building’s documentation as well as on the details of the picture.57

Notes

  1. 1Kondoleon 2016 (opens in a new tab). Introduction · Alexis Belis, Roman Mosaics in the J. Paul Getty Museum (2016). source record abcd
  2. 2İHA (opens in a new tab). İkinci Zeugma Tokat’ta gün yüzüne çıkartılıyor · İhlas News Agency (İHA) · agency copy published on Adana Masası. source record ab
  3. 3Princeton y1965-216 (opens in a new tab). Mosaic pavement depicting the drinking contest between Herakles and Dionysos · Inventory y1965-216. source record abcde
  4. 4Raff 2011 (opens in a new tab). The Roman Banquet · The Metropolitan Museum of Art. source record ↩
  5. 5DHA (opens in a new tab). Tokat’ta ‘Çingene Kızı’ benzeri mozaik gün yüzüne çıktı · Demirören News Agency (DHA). source record abc
  6. 6Vitruvius 7.1 (opens in a new tab), 7.1. On Architecture (De architectura) 7.1 · LacusCurtius · University of Chicago. source record ↩
  7. 7Alberti, Bourguignon and Roby 2013 (opens in a new tab). Technician Training for the Maintenance of In Situ Mosaics · Getty Conservation Institute · Institut National du Patrimoine. source record ab